


Floaty Frieghter

by LostInQueue



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: #RFRDrabbleMeThis, Bad lip reading songs, Canon Divergent, Drabble, F/M, First Kiss, Gen, Luke interfering with a test, Music, Pilot License, Pool Floaty, Stars, Summer, Swimming, Vigilante, Yoda - Freeform, bushes of love, crack and fluff, failing tests, floaty, hostiles on the hill, improper use of the force, its not a moon, luke skywalker was a radio star, not the future, oldies, seagulls stop it now, stealing the falcon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-26
Updated: 2019-06-27
Packaged: 2020-05-19 21:51:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19364674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LostInQueue/pseuds/LostInQueue
Summary: The only Millennium Falcon young Kylo Ren was allowed to pilot is a pool floaty replica.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was a prompt from Reylo Fic Rec's "Drabble Me This".  
> There will be more... <3 <3

“What do you mean? You told me when I got my galactic license, I could fly the falcon!” Ben whines. 

Surely, he didn’t mean to sound so immature, but his complaint only made him sound nasally. His little fit didn’t help him either, furthering his father’s commitment to his decision. 

“I need the Falcon. None of your ships make it past the first five flights,” Han grumbles, walking past Ben who is still sulking. 

“But those times—none of them were my fault!”

Han huffs a laugh, shaking his head as he goes. 

“They weren’t! That first ship was a lemon and you know it...”

“What about the three other ones?”

“Four...”

“See? You’re reckless, I bet you didn’t even try to use your gift to avoid—"

“That’s not how the force works.”

Han starts to laugh again.

“Luke did. He used the force...”

“And blew up the Death Star at your age,” Ben rolls his eyes, mimicking his father. 

“And? That has nothing to do with the Falcon... he was in an x-wing... you know those things are like a step up from a speeder.”

Han forces himself to hide his grin. 

“Look, Snow me you can handle your ship now... give it a year and maybe I’ll let you have a shot.”

The next year flies by, literally. Ben’s gotten himself into and out of trouble gaining him quite the reputation. He’s fixed himself a helmet complete with a hydrologic mask, making him look more threatening than he felt. He even went as far as giving himself a name, now going by Kylo Ren while he was out of his parent’s reach. 

Or so he thought. 

The force works in mysterious ways, alerting his uncle of his misuse of power. Luke grumbled for days about it when his conflict finally hit the boy’s mother across the galaxy. It took a day or two of bickering before the two of them could come up with a plan to keep his vigilante life from blooming into something more but when they got it, all that was left to do was let the force decide. 

___

“I don’t know if I should be happy to see you or ask for a different instructor.”

“Oh, we’re past that. Besides, they don’t know who I am,” Luke waves his hand slowly drawing a small arch with the palm suggesting Ben could be easily swayed. 

Ben isn’t amused but enters the cockpit of the shuttle just the same. 

“This is what you got, old man? What a hunk of junk.”

“It’s a freighter. Decided we might need the extra armor. You know, with all of the crashing you’ve been doing.”

That gained looks from other students, making Ben uncomfortable enough to shut his mouth until they fired up the engines. 

Luke was being his usual unhelpful self. He toyed with items all over the ship, making snarky comments throughout their ride, only to make it back and fail the boy yet again. 

“What gives you the right to deny me? You’re not even part of this division. You’re not even a teacher!”

Luke eyed him carefully while he pressed the declining code into his holonet ID. 

“I know what you’re up to and it stops now. You’re in too deep and taking the Falcon isn’t going to make it any easier for you. So, let me make the decision for you and end this now.” 

As the code finally updates Ben Solo as unfit to fly for the third time, it pushes his licensing back another two years. 

Ben, while furious, is no mongrel of the darkness. He was trying to eradicate it… not like Uncle Luke would ever know. The man is senile, only listening to the voices in his head. If he would only listen to him, he would know what had to be done. 

Going home made him feel worse. Han was there cleaning up the Falcon, Chewie was growling—probably at him, Ben was never sure. 

“How’d it go?”

“Don’t ask…”

“That bad eh?”

“Luke was my instructor! I swear he openly mocks me. ‘Tried to do that Jedi mind trick to me like it has ever had any effect on me whatsoever.” 

“He does it to me too, just like your mother… it must run in the family.”

Its now when Ben laughs. Oh, how he laughs. It must run in the family… that’s… that was remarkable for his father who never really seemed to be up on the comebacks. 

“Look, I know I said you couldn’t fly the Falcon unless you passed the test…”

“But you changed your mind?” Ben beams. 

“No, that’s the law. You can’t fly anything out of any atmosphere without it. But I do have a surprise for you in the back.”

A surprise? 

For…him?

It had to be a trick. 

It was a trick. Han spoke first as he rounded the back of their house overlooking the pool that Lando and Chewie finished putting together. 

“You got me a huge bucket filled with water?”

“No, that’s for me. You know how I feel about lakes.” Han picked up the heavy thin box from the chair facing the ledge and gave it to his boy. “I had it specially made, just for you.”

Ben looks down at the printed image on it and then back at his father. 

“Is this a joke?”

“Sort of?” Han shrugs.

“What the hell is it?” 

“It’s a replica flotation device. But, on the box it says it won’t save your life… they call it a floaty. You should have seen all the other ships that this vendor had. But you know me, the Falcon is the only one for my lot.”

Ben just stares at his father wondering if force punching him would be worth the aftershock. 

“Come on! I even convinced Chewie to blow it up for you.”

Ben who is still trying to deal with the news can only ask the obvious question with a little less anger behind it. “You got me a Floaty Freighter?”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben accepts his position on the floaty. He starts using the force to try turning up Luke’s radio scaring a girl he feels the need to hide from... even with his mask on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I’m having a little too much fun with this. 
> 
> Every summer for as long as I lifeguarded, the ONLY thing we could listen to were the oldies and since I spent so many summers guarding, summer + oldies just stuck. 
> 
> In this story, the oldies are the Star Wars Bad Lip Reading songs I have Luke being responsible for. If you haven’t heard them, it might be in your best interest to look up: “Seagulls Stop It Now”, “Bushes of Love”, “Hostiles on the Hill” and “Not the Future”.
> 
> The song stuck in my head for this one is “It’s Not A Moon” But Luke has no part in that one. It’s what’s driving the creative spin on this, because it can’t just be about the float. 😂😂😂

Leave it to his father to find a hole in the wall of a place that had just enough space to fit the large oval shaped above ground pool out back. Leaving only just enough of his yard on either side of the unit to have to weed wack, Han picked large slate slabs instead. Luke, who had conveniently taken up the open lot right next door, made some routine checks, using the force to push the seedlings deeper down into the ground as he went. He offended the force on many levels just so that Han wouldn’t damage his fence with the weed trimming tool they found in the outer rim. 

Luke, the odd ball, would use the force as he saw fit. Small, stupid things he shouldn’t have been able to control were his main focus now that the Death Star had been destroyed. Among them was convincing the music industry on Coruscant to give him his own single. Most of the population hadn’t head of him, and so when his first came out mocking Master Yoda, he had been pretty much ignored. Then again, the fact that it ever aired made him feel larger than life. Because of it, “Bushes of Love”, “Not the Future”, and “Hostiles on the Hill” came out. That last one, Ben can remember singing to just last year on some oldie broadcast. 

Something similar seems to be coming from his shed just down the lot. It’s faint but there’s a melody he can’t exactly place. It isn’t one of Luke’s, he’s sure of that, and yet he strains up from the pool floaty to hear it. While the sun beats down at his swim attire, mildly drying him while the float gives way to a fresh new stream of cold water making him shiver slightly as it goes. 

It doesn’t matter though. All he can think about is the sound.

Lapping water is infuriating.

It just is.

All he knows is that it’s louder than the music and that he’s running out of time. They never lasted long. They maybe all of two or three minutes and so he used the force to still the water long enough to hear the faint beat. But then it was gone.

If he could stop the waves in the pool, fine tuning them until they barely moved low or high enough to be considered waves, couldn’t he do it with sound waves?  
It’s all he can do now. His focus turns to the sound, his hand slightly turning from the wrist while he stretches his fingers in the direction of the shed. It takes a moment, maybe two before he can hear the song blip as he searches for the beginning.  

For a second he catches the weak sound, maybe a yip of something in the shed but pays no mind to it. In fact, he decides to turn up the volume a few notches to see if he could then hear the song instead of dealing with the infernal ambient sounds of nature and his father’s pals.

That was a mistake.

The yip turns into a screech of a scream which is far too loud for him to concentrate on controlling anything. And so, Ben drops his hold on the force. The song plays at full blast, startling him from his floaty freighter, while a blur of a figure rushes from the shed, under Luke’s deck.

Now blinded by the sun and water in his eyes Ben can only hear the ruckus. The person, if he had to guess was a girl? Maybe a teenager from the way she was carrying on. He rolled his eyes at her surprise... it’s not like Luke never did it.

Wait. 

Why is there a girl at Luke’s?

Ben blinks his eyes, forgetting completely about the song, looking quickly for the girl instead. Suddenly he feels odd for having his mask on in the pool. Technically, she can’t see him there. She’s too upset about the incident in the shed to care... but it doesn’t mean he looks away. 

Ben stands as tall as he can, his helmet still situated on his head, staring. He’s so in tune with trying to keep up with what’s happening he doesn’t see Chewie leap off of the deck and into the pool next to him. So much for his focus. All of the effort to still the water had evaporated in an instant. 

What was worse was now her focus had shifted from Luke to be next sound, their arguing. 

Chewie grumbled just as much as Ben did, his sour attitude mocked him from before. That is, until the seven foot drowned rat came to realize what was going on here. 

“Rey?” he yipped over his shoulder, studying Ben as he spoke. That’s it. Yep, the boy went stock still. It is exactly what he’s looking for when he shouts her name louder.

The girl doesn’t make a sound, just looks at him. Ben starts to sink down to his shoulders in the water as they start to go about their conversation. 

And then... she’s invited over...

No, no, no...

Ben perks up when she speaks again, telling him she can’t. 

Relief just barely hit him. They didn’t have to meet. Everything was fine now. She’d go back to work like she said... and he could... go back to... floating alone....  
 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was supposed to be for me! his inner child stomped.

The girl has worked all day.

He shouldn’t know this. 

But he does. 

He does because he’s used the force so many times for the radio, for the effort it kept taking to hush the world around him, several times he tried gushing her. Her thoughts were all over the place though. It made him curious. What was a pretty girl doing at Luke’s for work? Luke didn’t even work. Why would he need help doing anything?

Luke spent the rest of his days writing junky songs that would only increase the popular demand of his insanity. The man was trolling the public...and they ate it up. It was appalling, really. But that didn’t answer anything about the girl. 

As the sun started to set, lights from the surrounding city lit the sky instead.

The girl looked almost child like, except that is that she was clearly not a child, up at the lights above them. 

It dawned on him the moment she turned to him that he spoke.

“What?” she asked, her voice seemed to float carefully from her making him feel just as weightless. 

All he could do was swallow. He didn’t know what he said or what he should do now. She looked at him as if she could se past his mask. What did he still have it on? It was hot all day. What was the purpose of keeping it on? 

Oh right. 

The girl. 

He did not need her seeing into his soul. Judging from the scream he evicted from her that stabbed a path of guilt right through him, he did not need this girl to do the same with her eyes. And yet. He found he couldn’t look away. 

She’s beautiful, he thinks. Chewie called her Rey... he tries out her name a few times, again glad for his mask. If he hadn’t have had it on he would have no way to hide his over pronunciation of the three letters found there. Having no time to study her lovely features, he knows he’s losing time to respond... he knows she’s losing interest... and all that he can force himself to say now is, “what?”

Rey eyes him carefully. For a moment he’s sure she’s going to walk away. Her aura seems to fade from that bright lit being it was when he slipped before. Maybe he was seeing things but she seemed genuinely interested before...

Interested in him? 

Who’s ever been interested in him? 

He notices her mouth moving again and decides to stop all forward thinking. 

“You asked me if I’ve seen the stars...”

Oh! Oh, right! That thought... okay... he begins to brace himself for the next few words to make it past his lips. 

“Yeah, I did.”

Smooth. 

Her lips pushed tightly together, side eyeing the world around her before she speaks again. 

“No. I’ve never left the planet,” she pauses and he thinks she might be done speaking. “One day I will. But for now? These are my stars. 

Rey looked around in awe and once more back to the boy who asked his question. 

“Do you need that?”

“What?”

“Your mask? Like... does it help you breathe or something?”

“No.”

“No, what?”

“No I don’t need it and it doesn’t help me breathe.”

“Then why do you keep it on?”

The silence stretches between them unbearably so and once again he can feel her letting up.

“Sorry, I shouldn’t have asked. It’s not my business. I’ll let you go...”

Worried he wouldn’t see her again, he stopped her with the force. That was dumb. She looks at him scared and confused waiting for whatever it was that trapped her there to let go. 

“Wait,” he manages. “I, Rey,” he releases her. “Do you, are you done for the day?” 

Whatever that had her releases her as if the force field had tapered off on its own. 

“I need to— I have to go— thats the second time today that something strange has happened in this...”

“It was me!” he shouts a little louder than he means to. “I’m sorry... I have this gift and sometimes it...”

“Gets the better of you?” Rey’s eyes slit hoping he knows he crossed a line holding her in place and all.

“Yeah, I mean... yeah, I just, can’t control it all the time. If I get hyper focused on something I lose touch... I... I didn’t mean to scare you.” 

Ben’s shoulder’s feel so tense they might find permanent refuge inside his frame. It’s only when she nods at him that he seems to relax. 

Again, another bold question flies out of him before he can stop it. This time though, he heard what he said. 

“I have some stars right here,” he says, smoothly inviting her to swim with him. “Do you think I could convince you to take ‘er for a spin?”

He was right, the reflecting lights from the buildings did look like stars in the lapping water surrounding him. 

“Your sure you want to share that with me? I’ve been known to be a little reckless...”

Ben’s jaw drops open, still covered by his mask. The only reminder of this is when his chin hits the exposed metal encasing the hydraulic presses found there. 

His father called him reckless... if he was, just how sure of this did she think she was? Was she? Was this just some game? Was she just trying to get out of this conversation? 

Was...

She wasn’t. The girl spared little time hoping Luke’s fence. She leaped the two and a half feet that separated Luke’s from the lip of the pool, her body flung forward ready to barrel into the water like space junk. 

But she isn’t space junk.

Not to him. 

Stopping her before she broke the surface, he waved his hand, easily moving her upright to place her on his float, grinning like a fool while she stared dreamily past his visor. 

It’s all he could do not to gasp at her hunched figure nearly leaning in to what... to?

Kriff his mask.

She kissed his mask! 

It was supposed to be for me! his inner child stomped. 

Kriff!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Come on, I bet the Falcon is dying of jealousy"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok this is probably the shortest fic I've written, but it's naturally where the concept wanted to stop, so I'm not going to force it. If I come up with more, I'll add to it but it is currently done. :D <3 <3

His heart hammers in his chest, blood drumming through his ears, her closeness has him reeling. And yet he wants more. This damned mask. Why did he think this was cool again?

“That was very sweet of you,” Rey frowns as if deep in thought. Then asks, “What’s your name?”

What is his name? 

Ben can’t function. All of the thoughts he had all day about everything under the sun, and now he doesn’t even know his own name.

“It’s alright. You don’t have to tell me,” he watches her aura recede again. 

Maker he hates that. She asked a question. She shouldn’t feel—wait. He was the one having problems communicating... it was his fault. She did that because of him.

“Rey...”

“It’s fine— I crossed a line. I shouldn’t have...”

“No! I mean,” he corrected himself. “I just...” 

Ben hears the song he’s been trying to hear pick up in the background and it takes every bit of his willpower not to try to listen to it. She did decide to come in fully clothed like he was just to see some makeshift stars and pretend to fly away with him. 

“I’m Kylo,” he tests his twisted tongue. Besides this thing and his mind on warp speed, Ben found he couldn’t help himself when he picked Kylo over Ben.

“Kylo?” Ben listened to her test his chosen name over his given one, “That’s very exotic.” 

Perhaps it was but Ben couldn’t get over the fact that she didn’t laugh in his face, and more than that, didn’t mock him for it.

“Kylo…” Rey said it again. “I like it. I’d say you looked like a Kylo, but you still haven’t removed you mask… so I’m not certain that it’s true.”

It isn’t true. 

He doesn’t look like some man with roguish good looks. He’s a Solo. He looks like his father… well, he looks like a far younger version of him at least. To this he nods then notices it was seen by her as well. She said she didn’t mind… that he could keep it on… but he minded. Her pretty lips still held the moistness from her tongue. This he can clearly see sparkle at the curve of her bottom one from the lights above.

Even after his nod, he doesn’t remove it. Instead he clears his throat and offers her a ride. His ears he can feel burn at the way she doesn’t miss the innuendo. 

She’s quick to hold on, sensing that maybe this wouldn’t be as careful a ride. He already showed how little he could control, and yet he did set her down with ease just before. 

It’s as if she knows when he’s heard her thoughts, her eyes flick back to his, rather the visor that separates her gaze. 

Ben carefully uses the force to move her, not exactly looking to toss her in either direction though. His main focus was to push her so that she could enjoy whatever else he may have to offer her here. Besides, his float didn’t have handles like the boat that Chewie insisted on earlier today. It would be awfully rude to throw her and all.

Ben watches her as the smile spread a cross her face. 

“Oh, Kylo,” he’s died. 

He knows this. 

His hand slips listening to her say his name as he pushes her just a little more through the lighter ripples at the surface. It takes all of his willpower not to turn her around and pull her back. 

And yet it still happens. She’s turned herself and is on her way back to him. 

Swallowing hard, he looks around to see if Luke is trolling him, but his presence isn’t detectable. 

Is she?

Does she know?

Does she want a teacher?

He could show her everything…

Any yet, he feels like he knows nothing.

“How about you show me the real stars?” Rey looks up as if she could see past the buildings. 

Its time for the truth, unlike the slip of his name…

“I can’t. I didn’t pass. I don’t have my license.”

He waits for her to laugh. Surely, she would. No one his age except for senators who had no use for their licenses, had them. But she didn’t. She simply bites her lip, smiling as she does…

“With a name like Kylo, you don’t really strike me as one that takes no for an answer. Come on, I bet the Falcon is dying of jealousy,” she says slapping the side of his float. 

Again, glad for his mask while it hides his lopsided grin, he nods towards the ship thinking, “This girl is going to be the death of me.”


End file.
